Ride + Style Crit Qualifier in Arizona

Published on April 15th, 2012

The main reason for me heading out to Phoenix was to come check out and shoot a qualifier crit race for Ride + Style hosted by State Bicycle Co and Red Bull which went down last night. I headed down to Tempe Beach Park with State Bike founder Mehdi Farsi where registration was taking place at 9, and had the opportunity to make new friends as well as say hi to many I hadn’t seen in a while. Once sign ups were finished, the ride headed towards Papago park to an empty lot where State had setup cones for the crit race. It was challenging trying to light the riders while not blinding them in the middle of a race, but angling the lights towards their backs from the sides worked out fine.

The races went on for a few hours, with Phoenix’s finest deciding to circle a helicopter directly over the race course following the riders for a few laps. Steven Jensen tried to wheelie the entire course, but surprisingly couldn’t keep up with the racers on his trick bike. PHX Bike shop owner Palmer Martinez entered in the race, and made it all the way to the finals. In the final laps of the last race Craig Streit pulled to the head of the pack and took first place, with other Arizona native Max Rich pulling in at second. Edgar Torres made the trek out from LA to take third. It was great to see such a close race with no crashes, and such over all positive energy.

Alot of people were asking about photos last night, and I have more then I wanted to post on here. You can download a zip with more on sendspace. Drop me a message through this site if you know I shot a photo of you that you want and it’s not in that zip.